The God Culture: Penis Piercing Proves Pinoys Aren't Israelites

For years Timothy Jay Schwab who is The God Culture has floated around the thesis that Filipinos are actually members of the Lost Tribes of Israel. He has employed etymology, geography, theology, prophecy, and many other subjects to make his case. But what does it mean to be a member of the nation of Israel? Covenant membership via circumcision of course. Despite circumcision being the non-negotiable sign of the covenant, Tim hasn't said much about it as concerns pre-Spanish Filipinos. So, let's be like Antonio Pigafetta and examine the members of Filipinos to see if they practiced circumcision as the sign and seal of their covenant with Yahweh.  

In his journal Pigafetta writes:

Those people go naked, wearing but one piece of palm-tree cloth about their privies. The males, large and small, have their penis pierced from one side to the other near the head, with a gold or tin bolt as large as a goose quill. In both ends of the same bolt, some have what resembles a spur, with points upon the ends; others like the head of a cart nail. I very often asked many, both old and young, to see their penis, because I could not credit it. In the middle of the bolt is a hole, through which they urinate. The bolt and the spurs always hold firm. They say that their women wish it so, and that if they did otherwise they would not have communication with them. When the men wish to have communication with their women, the latter themselves take the penis not in the regular way and commence very gently to introduce it [into their vagina], with the spur on top first, and then the other part. When it is inside it takes its regular position; and thus the penis always stays inside until it gets soft, for otherwise they could not pull it out. Those people make use of that device because they are of a weak nature. They have as many wives as they wish, but one of them is the principal wife. When- ever any of our men went ashore, both by day and by night, every one invited him to eat and to drink. Their viands are half cooked and very salty. They drink frequently and copiously from the jars through those small reeds, and one of their meals lasts for five or six hours. The women loved us very much more than their own men. All of the women from the age of six years and upward, have their vaginas gradually opened because of the men's penises.

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=txu.059173001899092&seq=180

Pigafetta tells us that Cebuano men had their penises pierced at the request of their wives. He says he asked many times to see the penises of old and young men. He was shocked at what he found. Did he find that Filipinos were keeping the covenant of the nation of Israel by being circumcised? No. He found that the men had pierced their members with a large gold or tin bolt. He saw what was culturally significant. And it wasn't circumcision. 

While it's true that Pigafetta did not say they weren't circumcised he certainly did not say they were. Instead he noted the most significant aspect of these men's members which was the piercing. This piercing is antithetical to circumcision. Infant circumcision altered the penis by removing the foreskin and grafting the child into the nation of Israel. The piercing and altering of the penis at the insistence of the women for sexual pleasure was purely worldly and never sanctioned in the scriptures. In fact body modification for sensual or superstitious reasons is explicitly condemned in the Law of Moses:

Leviticus 19:28 “Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the LORD.”

In Leviticus 19:28, Israelites were forbidden from certain body modifications associated with pagan customs. While that text speaks of tattoos and cutting for the dead, it shows that modifying the body for reasons unrelated to covenantal purity was not acceptable in biblical Israel.

These modifications were not only amongst Cebuanos but amongst the Visayans as a whole. Antonio de Morga writes.

The natives of the islands of Pintados, especially the women, are very vicious and sensual. Their perverseness has discovered lascivious methods of communication between men and women; and there is one to which they are accustomed from their youth. The men skilfully make a hole in their virile member near its head, and insert therein a serpent's head, either of metal or ivory, and fasten it with a peg of the same material passed through the hole, so that it cannot become unfastened. With this device, they have communication with their wives, and are unable to withdraw until a long time after copulation. They are very fond of this and receive much pleasure from it, so that, although they shed a quantity of blood, and receive other harm, it is current among them. These devices are called sagras, and there are very few of them, because since they have become Christians, strenuous efforts are being made to do away with these, and not consent to their use; and consequently the practice has been checked in great part.

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=coo.31924105724524&seq=132

These body modifications known as palang were found all throughout the Philippines as Tom Harrison notes in the Journal Of The Malaysian Branch Of The Royal Asiatic Society

The variety of these clearly more or less authentic and usually ‘'eye witness” accounts further indicate the range, — both geographical (including Panay, Negros, Bohol, Cebu, Minadanao and Leyte ) and technical, — of palang- type devices in the Philippines four centuries ago, long before any detailed historical records are available for west Borneo.

https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.280676/page/n437/mode/2up

This sexual cultural practice, in contradistinction to covenantal circumcision, was nearly universal in the pre-Spanish Philippines.

Infant circumcision on the eighth day is exactly what is missing amongst Filipinos to qualify them as members of the Lost Tribes of Israel. Tim believes the whole nation is peppered with the Lost Tribes as evidenced in the alleged Hebrew etymology of place-names. These names appear from Luzon to Mindanao. But where is the uniform practice of infant covenant circumcision on the eighth day? It doesn't exist. Alongside circumcision, other markers of Israelite identity such as Sabbath observance, kosher laws, biblical festivals, the sacrificial system, and the Hebrew language have completely vanished, leaving no credible covenantal or liturgical trace.

In Mindanao the Muslim Moros have been practicing circumcision for hundreds of years but that is because of the introduction of Islam. Today Filipinos circumcise young boys when they are much older than eight days old. It is usually done between 4 and 10 years of age and as a social rite of passage or for medical reasons. If Filipinos are Israelites, why did the practice of infant covenant circumcision vanish while a contradictory, indigenous custom took prominence?

Infant circumcision isn’t a peripheral issue, it is central to the identity of biblical Israel. It’s a theological cornerstone that Tim has never addressed, and likely never will, because the evidence is irreconcilable with his thesis. The fact is, Pigafetta's first-hand description of pierced Pinoy penises is an undeniable cultural anchor that disproves the claims of Timothy Jay Schwab who is The God Culture. 

The God Culture: Horsing Around

Timothy Jay Schwab who is The God Culture continues to trot along in his vain attempts to prove the Lequios Islands are the Philippines. Specifically he claims Northern Luzon and the Batanes Islands are the Lequios Islands and thus the place where Fernando Pinto shipwrecked. During his time on Lequios Island Pinto mentioned that horsemen were among the inhabitants. So, where are the horses on Batanes Island and Northern Luzon? Tim claims to have the answer. They were covered-up and forgotten because of  racism. 

🐎 The Forgotten Horses of the Philippines 

Most people assume the horse arrived in the Philippines riding alongside the Spanish conquistadors. After all, kabayo — the Tagalog word for horse — sounds a lot like caballo, the Spanish term. Maybe. Such banter and wordplay is not academic forgetting prior history and other local names of horses 

But what if that assumption is dead wrong? 

What if horses had been in the Philippines long before Legazpi’s ships ever touched shore and before Pinto's famous shipwreck on the Isles of Lequios, Philippines? 

That’s exactly what David B. Mackie, an American agricultural officer in the early 1900s, uncovered — and the evidence he compiled isn’t just interesting... it’s paradigm-shifting. This century-old reference is ignored by many from the Jesuit paradigm such as Dr. Austin Craig who clearly came to manipulate the history of the Philippines. It is time to recognize this Colonial bias for what it is... racism.  

🧭 A Four-Part Horse History 

In a forgotten gem published in The Journal of Heredity in 1916, Mackie outlines four major eras in the history of horses in the Philippines:

1. Pre-horse era — Horses were unknown. 

1. Malay Muslim introduction — Horses came via Sumatra and Malaysia, especially to the Sulu archipelago. 

1. Spanish period — Horses arrived not from Spain, but from China and Japan. 

1. American breeding era — Western breeds introduced for improvement. 

But the most important — and suppressed — is the second era: the Muslim-led arrival of horses long before Spain.

This is Tim's introduction and already he is off to a bad start. First of all he writes:

After all, kabayo — the Tagalog word for horse — sounds a lot like caballo, the Spanish term. Maybe. Such banter and wordplay is not academic forgetting prior history and other local names of horses

Banter and wordplay between similar words is not academic? But that is Tim's exact etymological methodology when attempting to derive Hebrew words from Tagalog. Tim brushes off the connection between those words but the fact is Tagalog has many Spanish loanwords which is only natural seeing as the Spanish occupied  the Philippines for 400 years. 

Borrowed from Spanish caballo, from Latin caballus.

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/kabayo

Tim's source for the claims in this article is David B. Mackie who writes about the introduction of horses into Mindanao, specifically Sulu. That is not Northern Luzon and the Batanes. Where are the horses in Northern Luzon and Batanes which pre-date the arrival of the Spanish? That's what Tim needs to focus on and prove. 

🕌 The Malay Muslims Brought Horses First 

According to Mackie’s research, horses were already present in Mindanao and Sulu before Magellan’s arrival. The Sulu and Maguindanao peoples didn’t just have horses — they had their own indigenous words for them: 

• Kuda (Sulu)

• Kura (Maguindanao) 

These are not borrowed from the Spanish caballo. In contrast, upland tribes unfamiliar with horses before colonization use kabayo — a clear Spanish loanword. 

That linguistic distinction alone is a red flag to any real researcher: horses didn’t come from Spain — they came earlier. 

🐘 Royal Gifts, Trade Routes, and a Pre-Spanish Powerhouse 

Mackie traces horse arrival to the Malayan Islamic expansion of the 14th century. The arrival of figures like Makdum, Rajah Baginda, and Abu Bakr — princes and scholars from Sumatra — brought with them not only religion and law, but animals for war, trade, and prestige. 

These weren't isolated events. The Sulu Sultanate was in contact with:

• Sumatra

• Brunei

• Java

• China

• Japan 

And they weren’t just trading spices and silk. 

They were trading horses.  

Spanish records confirm this: 

In 1578, Don Esteban Rodriguez de Figueroa warned Governor Sande that: 

“These Moros are most dangerous people, being familiar with all manner of firearms and with horses.”

(Mackie, 1916, p. 375) 

So yes — before Spanish colonization, the south had horses. Likely for centuries. Records suggest they came through Sumatra and let us not forget at the time of Magellan, the King of Zebu was originally from Sumatra. Ignoring the Muslim record only citing the newer account is not academic.

It's hilarious how Tim declares a thing is not academic when his whole project is unacademic pseudo-history. What we learn in this section is the Moros had horses before the Spanish arrived and even had their own names for horses. Tim says that is proof that kabayo is not derived from cabello. 

There are several things wrong here. First of all, Tagalog is not the same language as Tausug which is the language spoken in Sulu. Second of all, and most importantly, the Spanish NEVER subdued Mindanao completely. 

In the Philippines: 

• Spain conquers portions of Mindanao and Jolo and imposes protectorate status over the Moros of Sulu.
• Spain failed to completely subjugate Moros.
• While Spain conquered portions of Mindanao, the Sulu Sultanate of Sulu submitted to protectorate status through Spain's extensive use of military resources.
• Moro resistance against Spanish colonial authorities continue until the 1898 US capture of the Philippines.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish–Moro_conflict

There was not the same level of interaction between the Spanish and Mindanao as there was with the Visayas and Luzon. 

So, the Southern Philippines had horses. Great. What about the north? What about Tim's alleged location of the Lequios Islands, Batanes and Northern Luzon?

🐉 China and Japan: Not Spain 

When horses finally appeared in northern Luzon, it wasn’t Spanish stallions that disembarked. 

It was Chinese and Japanese horses. 

Mackie records that: 

• In 1583, King Philip II ordered large shipments of horses from China.

• In 1587, thirty Chinese ships arrived in Manila — with horses.

• The Nambu horse from Japan was introduced into Cagayan and Ilocos Norte. 

Even the Spanish historian Antonio de Morga wrote in 1604: 

“There were no horses, mares or asses in the islands until the Spaniards had them brought from China and Japan.”

(Mackie, p. 378) 

Morga was wrong on this. Perhaps he did not spend any time in North Luzon, which is Lequios, where he should have been seeking horses according to Pinto. Anyone quoting Morga as fact on this, is not offering an honest record.  

That alone shatters the colonial myth. 

🐎 The Native Breeds: More Than Just Ponies 

Through fieldwork across every province, Mackie identified five distinct native horse types, including: 

• The Sulu pony — stocky and ancient, descended from Sumatra.

• The Chinese horse — thickset, powerful, short-legged.

• The Nambu type — long-bodied, large-hooved, found in northern Luzon.

• A breed with Arab-like features — refined and muscular, likely through Indian or Persian trade.

• A widespread rural “scrub” type — undersized due to poor breeding and neglect. 

These were real, viable animals — not myth. Some areas like Catanduaneshad over 3,000 horses in the early 1900s alone, with over 55% showing dun or buckskin coloring, a trait tied to ancient Eurasian breeds. 

In researching this fully, one will find a narrative where horses were claimed in a Chinese shipwreck which turned out to be donkeys. That is then formed in propaganda that it means there were no horses in the Philippines. This kind of insane propaganda persists in academia and it is time to smash through the Colonial ceiling and correct this once and for all. It may well be valid they were donkeys but that account is not the position of ancient horses in the Philippines.  

This is the same for the word which derives from Spain which is not the only word for horse used locally, yet, that singular point is posited by many to claim they were not here. The statement is meaningless and born in ignorance. Grow up Colonial propagandists. 

In this section Tim admits that King Philip II imported horses from China and Japan. He writes that as if it's a revelation. Why would the Spanish ship horses all the way from Spain? They would likely not survive the arduous trip. importing horses from Japan and China would be much more practical.

Tim then cites Antonio Morga who writes:

“There were no horses, mares or asses in the islands until the Spaniards had them brought from China and Japan.”

According to Tim, Morga is wrong.

Morga was wrong on this. Perhaps he did not spend any time in North Luzon, which is Lequios, where he should have been seeking horses according to Pinto. Anyone quoting Morga as fact on this, is not offering an honest record.  

"Anyone quoting Morga as fact on this, is not offering an honest record?" But the citation comes from Mackie and Tim is relying upon him for this entire article! Is Mackie not honest? Then why uses him as a source? As for Morga, Tim has quoted him many times yet now all of a sudden he is a liar. 

But riddle me this: If Northern Luzon had native horses why did the Spanish need to import them from China and Japan? 

That is the end of Tim's analysis and so far he has not proven there was a native horse culture in Northern Luzon and Batanes. Here is what Pinto wrote concerning horsemen on Lequios Island:

While we were all locked in this painful trance, six horsemen rode up to us, and at the sight of us there on our knees, naked and unarmed, with two dead women in our midst, they took such pity on us that four of them promptly headed back to the people following them on foot and kept them in check where they were, without permitting anyone to do us any harm. Then they returned, bringing with them six of the men on foot who appeared to be ministers of justice, or at least, the kind of justice that we thought God had in store for us at the time.

At the command of the men on horseback, these six tied us all up in groups of three. Showing signs of compassion, they told us not to be afraid because the king of the Ryukyus was a God-fearing man, well inclined by nature to the poor, to whom he was always very charitable, and they gave us their word, swearing by their faith, that he would do us no harm. These words of consolation, however pious they appeared to be on the surface, did not satisfy us in the least, for by then we had lost all hope of life so that even if we had been told this by someone we trusted completely, we still would have found it hard to believe, much less a group of cruel, tyrannical heathens who had neither religion nor any knowledge of God.

Pinto's Travels, pg. 288-289

It was past three in the afternoon when a courier on horseback came riding into town in great haste and delivered a letter to the xivalem, who was their local military commander. As soon as he read it, he immediately ordered two drums to be beaten by way of summoning the townspeople, who responded to the call by assembling in a large temple of their worship. There, framed in a window, he addressed them, informing them of the orders he had received from the broquem, governor of the kingdom, to the effect that they were to take us to the city of Pongor, seven leagues from there.

The majority of the people protested, voicing their objections to this order six or seven times, and a heated argument ensued, as a result of which nothing was agreed on that day except to send the courier back to the broquem with an explanation of what was happening. Consequently, they were forced to keep us confined there until eight o'clock the following day when two peretandas—who are like magistrates—arrived, accompanied by a crowd of people from the city, including twenty men on horseback. After taking us into custody with detailed documents drawn up by notaries public, they departed immediately. Late in the afternoon of the same day we reached a town called Gundexilau, where they put us into an underground dungeon, in which we spent the night, suffering unbearable hardship, in a pool of water swarming with leeches that left us all quite bloody.

pg. 290

From these passages in Pinto's journal it's pretty clear that the horsemen were part of the military. So, where is the Filipino calvary in Northern Luzon and Batanes? That is what Tim has to prove and he has failed to do so. 

This article exhibits every bad trait of The God Culture. There are half-truths, there is unwarranted extrapolation, and there is the disdain for real history and name calling for those who do not tow Tim's line. It is illogical to say Sulu had horses therefore there was a unified horse culture throughout the Philippine archipelago including Batanes and Northern Luzon. Tim is making assumptions rather than offering hard proof.  This is not just bad history, it's bad horse-story! To that I say, Grow up Timothy Jay Schwab who is The God Culture.